


presto

by Velairena



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-08-13 19:34:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 16,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7983583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velairena/pseuds/Velairena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At a presto tempo of life, can you keep up?</p><p>Yui Akaashi has only one regret in life.<br/>And that was developing the habit of giving up way too easily.</p><p>And unfortunately for her, that exact same habit is going to really going to test her limits as she would soon have to juggle being both a world-famous pianist whose fame causes her way too much trouble than she cares for, and a 'formerly' retired figure skater; whose recently-depressed, semi-quitting, miserable moron of a  kouhai returns to their hometown and is suddenly taken under the wing of her former skating partner -- whose actual pupil then begs her to coach him. </p><p>So basically, she's really going to have to step up her game to manage not to murder someone -- Yuuri -- her kouhai, with a rolling pin.</p><p>And it was all supposed to be a relaxing break from the world to remember the old times.</p><p>Sure.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. epigraph

 

 

 

> **_At some point, you just pull off the Band-Aid, and it hurts, but then it's over and you're relieved._ **

**-John Green, _Looking for Alaska_**

 

It hurt to leave skating, that's why Yui Akashi promised herself she would make sure her best friend would never have to experience the same pain.


	2. character intro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> describing characters + oc

_Yūri_ [Yuuri] _Katsuki_ , a 23-year-old figure skater who is faint-hearted and gains weight easily. He's the "figure skater with the world's biggest glass heart." His favorite dish is a 900kcal breaded pork cutlet bowl. His greatest skating assets are his peculiar sense of rhythm and unique step. However, he is weak to pressure and messes up at crucial moments. He's at a crucial point in his career, and he bets everything on one last skating season.

 _Yui Akaashi_ , a 26-year-old renowned pianist whose fame causes her more trouble than she cares for. The world seems to have more than just high hopes for the former brilliant athlete to return to the stage of the figure skating world. She's often described as a sadist for enjoying making sarcastic, partially offensive, not to mention disturbing comments at the dispense of others, and is known for her martial arts prowess. She is Yūri's childhood friend and mentor, also the one who introduced him to figure skating.

 _Victor Nikiforov_ , a 27-year-old "living legend" who has garnered the attention of the world. He is a skater who has won five consecutive world championships. He is popular with men and women of all ages, and he has a rock star-like charisma. Yūri has been chasing after him since he was a child. Victor begins to take an interest in Yūri for a strange reason.

 _Yuri_ _Plisetsky_ , a 15-year-old next-generation Russian figure skater who has won three consecutive junior world championships. Because of his looks, he is called the "Russian Fairy," but as soon as he steps off the ice he becomes vulgar and acts more like a delinquent. He is an ambitious person who believes without a doubt he will become the best in the world.


	3. one. "the lonely pianist."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yui is a sadist.  
> Yuuri just wants to find his love for skating again.
> 
> Neither expected a buck naked Viktor Nikiforov to be waiting at the Katsuki family onsen for them.

The ice is only for one person alone.

That was why, for some people, there couldn't be an even more appealing reason to skate.

The ice is for one person alone. Even within pairs, couples, each partner would sought to be  _the_ _one_  that audiences looked for and became transfixed with when they skated. That is why that when all said and done, for all those that fought, conquered, devoured and clawed their ways up to the top couldn't be more invincible. 

Which was why that ache, that  _ache_  to skate, to  _win_  couldn't simply just  _disappear_  after all those years she spent on the top. But she had learned to control it. 

However, this time, the ache didn't just  _come_.

It wasn't because had Japan lost,  _again_. Or that Yuuri, that fumbling, nervous, depressed, clumsy, miserable idiot messed up at the crucial moment _, again_.

It was because she saw her former partner skate again. And he looked every bit as magnificent and graceful as he did the first time she saw him skate, and she was  _fucking_  jealous.

How many competitions and programs had he won the past two years on the ice she had abandoned? 

How many concerts and events she had attended after looking at a rink somewhere longingly?

Too many times. Too many times, too many, and Yui Akaashi wasn't keen on remembering. 

***

Kyushu had always been lovely. But what ultimately made Yui's day was the half-shocked, half-terrified expression Yuuri displayed when he noticed all the posters and banners with his names and picture on. 

Yui snickered. People's pain always turned into amusement for her. However, this time, the sadistic side of her was much stronger than her compassionate one, because Yuuri lost the Grand Finale,  _even_  after all that precious time she wasted training the miserable bastard for all those jumps and spins.  _And then he went and messed it up_.

So all Yui did was watch Minako have her way with the  _megane_  and wait patiently for her turn.

The three of them didn't even step in Yuuri's family's hot spring for a second before Yui took him up by the collars with a terrifying smile. "You don't look so good," she said with a predatory-like undertone. "Have you been training lately?" And with that, she stepped back and watched Minako pale and then darken her visage with the sudden reminder and ripped off all of Yuuri's thick jackets and undercoats with a similar maniacal grin as herself and pulled off his sweater, as Yui had anticipated, a huge dollop of fat dropped out.

There was a moment of silence before everyone burst out cackling.

Yuuri immediately looked to his  _senpai_ , who looked like she was having the time of her life snickering along with the rest of her family and tried to glare at her. Keyword.  _Tried_. And failed miserably and only succeeded in making the rest laugh even harder.

His father managed to stop laughing for a second and squeeze out, "you're just like you mother!" And then went back to laughing like the rest of them. While he glanced back to his mentor, Yui, who was grinning that familiar, smug, cheshire grin that clearly translated:  _payback._

Yuuri groaned. Despaired, he cried. " _Senpai,_ really?" But he hid a smile, after all—

He was _home._

***

The next few weeks went by uneventfully, with her  _kouhai_  holing himself up in his room, and her dragging him out for fresh air, and repeatedly ranting Viktor's free skate, which was coming up so often that Yui would do anything to keep him quiet.

Until today, that is. Yui decided he needed exercise, and had the good graces to drag him to Hasetsu rink to see Yuko, who immediately beamed. And slammed the keys into their face, then scrambled off, screaming over her shoulder that she would be back in a minuet. So Yui looks to Yuuri with a smile. "You ready,  _kouhai-chan_?" 

As Yuuri gets ready, Yui takes out her phone and loads a channel with a live streaming of the routine of her former partner and waits patiently, both for Viktor and Yuuri.

Unsurprisingly, it is Viktor who starts first. 

Like always, he stuns her. Graceful spins and lutz's, expression perfect, form flawless, it was like the entire rink was entranced with his illusion. The ice was his stage, the slashes and scratches of the blade a part of the orchestra, the clicks of the toes of his skates the accents in his play. He was the conductor, the rink was his orchestra. He was the artist, his body creating a masterpiece of poses and techniques. The audience and spectators were quiet, even the commentators didn't dare to make a sound other than reporting the names of the movements, it was as if they themselves were afraid that if they made a single sound, the image would ripple, the magic broken.

Yui's breath caught in her throat. Suddenly, emotions threatened to suffocate her, and the urge to skate was overwhelming, like a single flame of the candle streaking across the oily branches of a pine forest, unending, unexpected,  _unstoppable_.

She should have expected this. 

So instead, Yui tucks away her phone and focuses on the reality. To the rink in front of her, and to the light haired girl who was once the Madonna of Hasetsu. And for Yuuri.

Yuuri. And only Yuuri.

He comes out a few minutes later, dressed in the familiar dark shirt and black, blue striped pants Yui herself once wore, alongside Yuko and Nishigori. And then the unexpected thing happens.

Without warning, the first note rings across the frozen ice, her  _kouhai_ 's head bows low, he spreads his arms like wings, and repeats the routine Yui had just seen and carved into her mind not long before. But when Yuuri was skating, it was different. The routine and the moves were still the same, alongside the music, the beat and the expressions. But it seemed like somehow, Yuuri was different this time.

This time, he skated with confidence. With expressions. With accents. With dreams and emotions that were his own.

It was like Yuuri was no longer chasing just after Viktor's shadow, but the wisps and tangles and loose threads of his own dreams. And with that, the indescribable feeling of her throat tightening and eyes stinging from the salty tears came over her again. And unlike Viktor's routine of masterpieces and tested depths, Yuuri's was like a newborn butterfly, just clambering out of his cocoon, no longer the caterpillar he once was, and ready to explore the world.

When the last spin was done. Both she, and Yuko were silent for a moment. Before Yuko's eyes went wide and started cackling. " _Sugoi, sugoi, sugoi._ " She giggled. "That was just like Viktor's! I thought you'd be super depressed after something like last year."

And Yuuri,  _Yuuri_. Yui narrowed her eyes at her  _kouhai_ , with all the nerve he had began chuckling. "Well, I wasn't sure, but I just really wanted you and  _senpai_ , to see, Yu- _chan_." He said, rubbing his arms. "I kept thinking back to before, when you,  _senpai_  and I used to try to copy him. I guess I'm just trying to rediscover my love for skating." He laughed.

Yui's mouth dropped open. " _Just, just_?!" She screeches. " _Do you have any idea how much you looked like him?!_ " She screamed, launching herself at him and grabbing him by the collar. 

He instantly panicked. "I just..."

And then, miraculously, the miserable bastard was saved.

Three head suddenly popped out from under Yuko, in the order of blue, purple and pink which Yui instantly recognized as girl triplets Axel, Lutz, and Loop. This, time, both she and Yuuri sweat dropped.

Yuko, however, just beamed with delight. "Haven't they grown since you guys last saw them?" She chirped.

And then suddenly, it was like a bunch of carbon copies of Yui suddenly appeared, just younger and chubbier with baby fat. 

_"Yuuri! You really did get fat!"_

_"Are you really retiring?"_

_"Have you never had a girlfriend before, Yuuri?"_

Yui and Yuuri both slowly backed away with Yuko trying desperately to pin and calm down the triplets, until the familiar sliding sound of skating blades reached their ears and they turned back. 

It was Takeshi Nigishiro. Yui instantly perked up, seemingly to have momentarily forgotten her formerly disturbed conscience. She grinned. "Nigishiro!" They shared a grin. She had a playmate now!

"They all you fans, Yuuri," he started with a warm smile. And then he slid forward and wrapped an arm around his neck with the three girls suddenly appearing around the two guys—  _And then it happened._  Yui snickered. Nishigori pulled up Yuuri's thin shirt and his fat stomach dropped out. Takeshi laughed and patted it, while the three girls started taking pictures and videos of it, still amused.

Yui grinned.  _I knew I could count on you, Nishigori._

But eventually, all fun things came to a stop with Takeshi giving his usual warm speech, and the two of  them set back for the onsen, with Yuuri suddenly frantic that he had missed Viktor's performance and Yui agreeing to help him find a channel, keeping the warning about seeing  _another_  Yuri to herself.

She shouldn't have. 

Yuuri totally freaked out seeing the other one, and it was like no one could stop him or his hysterics and she and Saeko, another regular at the Katsukis' hot spring managed to drag him up to his room, where  there he  _finally_  managed to calm down. 

But not for long.

Both Yui and Yuuri blanched seeing the uploaded video of him skating Viktor's free skate routine, and Yui noted duly, that among the short time the video had been released, there were already millions of views, retweets, and comments. It went  _viral_. Distantly she could hear Yuko scolding the kids and someone crying and another disagreeing. Yui sucked on her lips.  _He_ was bound to see this. 

And then all hell broke loose. Yuuri suddenly fainted, and Minako, the old hag, suddenly recovered from her hangover, slamming open the door and demanded why the damned video was being retweeted  _everywhere_. She could literally hear Hisashi Morooka, the commentator at Yuuri's match squeak out a, "Katsuki- _kun,_ you have time to do  _this_?!" And the other Yuri, making a comment about how the Japanese one was a moron or an idiot, or something along those lines.

Yui paled even more. Viktor Nikiforov was  _really bound_  to see it. 

_Fuck her life._

***

It was only a few days later when he came in. As Toshio- _san_ , Yuuri's dad described, when the familiar poodle tackled her when she returned and demanded who the  _thing_  belonged to. The old man only said cheerfully it came with a 'good looking foreign guest' that was when she had already suspected who it was.

But what proved her ultimately suspicions were the and the indistinct yelps, the murmurs of a distantly familiar voice, and Yuuri's " _WHAT_?!" ripping  through and across the air of the entire hot springs.

Yui sucked in a breath and curled herself up tighter on the couch.

 _Now you've_ really _done it, Yuuri._


	4. two. "tragedy of skaters."

To lose the willingness and need to skate is like death for skaters.

She started skating at seven. She retired at twenty-four. The reason of her fall from grace was simple. A disease. The disease that had befallen many others, before her. After her: the disease of the loss of passion.

Had the same disease consumed her former partner?

The answer was true and obvious.

No, it had not. 

Yui knows Viktor Nikiforov, that charming, charismatic, bright, brilliant legend of Russia. That cunning, ruthless, relentlessly selfish skater on the rink. That was exactly who he is. And being the relentlessly selfish skater he is, this is the poisonous, tempting, irresistible fruit he offers and bears. 

She knows that man. Better than anyone else in the skating world, better than  _anyone else_ on the  _planet_. And she knows, the reason why Viktor Nikiforov was coaching Yuuri Katsuki was not because of that skating video Yuko's triplets posted on YouTube. It was the fire, that  _fire_ , he saw in Yuuri, that fire that burned so brightly, clear even on the screen. The reason Viktor Nikiforov wants Yuuri Katsuki was because Viktor wanted Yuuri to reignite Viktor's own burnt out embers and kindle. 

 _What a selfish man_ , Yui thought.  _Going halfway across the world just to follow a personal, useless motto of pride and personality._

***

_For the blonde boy and his mentors, the story started quietly._

*  
【 _Note: the clock references' meaning is how much time Yui had before she lost her passion for skating_ 】

_The clock starts ticking at twelve._

_"Sure," Viktor Nikiforov replies. "If you win the Junior Championships without quads, I'll choreograph a routine: just for you." The man and the boy clasps hands as the man turns and looks at their coach. "Sorry, Yakov, I can't do what you say this one time."_

_Behind someone snickered. A woman stepped out from behind the doors, dark hair bellowing, hands stuck in pockets. "You don't get to say that, Vitya," she retorts. "Because you never have."_

_The boy's eyes narrowed. "Who are you?" For a moment, he contemplates on replying for her; someone who dares to interrupt my conversation with Viktor._

_She only grins and glides over to the boy. "Yuri Plisetsky?" Her eyes sparkle. "Akaashi, Yui." She grins. "Hajimemashite."_

_His eyes widen. "You're the one that arranges the music for Viktor!" His head shoots back towards Viktor, but the man is gone, gone from his sight but wrapping an arm around his partner on and off the ice of five years and grinning at Yuri. Offering Yuri something he couldn't refuse._

_"Yuri, if you win the Junior Championships until your Senior Debut, I will choreograph your routine, and Yui will arrange your music." Viktor Nikiforov says._

_*_

_The clock is at ten._

_Yuri quickly learns the differences between Yui Akaashi and Viktor Nikiforov._

_While Viktor is at the top of the world, he is but a king that only tolerates his humble subjects with a kind, but mocking smile, and movements on the ice that were just a little bit too show off for a normal short or free program. And the voices of his fans never truly reached him._

_Yui was the one that worked and trained alongside the peasants, the commoners and the lowly subjects like them._ Viktor _only told Yuri that Yes, he was indeed a genius. But Yuri knew that, that genius would be lost and wasted if he didn't know how to use it. And it was_ Yui _who showed him all those techniques on calming ones fear and how to relax or stretch your muscles in a short time that was efficient and simple._

_*_

_The clock makes makes a stop at seven._

_Yui Akaashi is like an artist. Yuri realizes. With simple words, she could tweak with a person's emotions and perspectives. And stun entire audiences with just a few notes._

_She can either offer you surprises around every corner, and keep you on your toes. Or a shoulder to lean on and a pair of gentle hands to hold and cling and reach for._

_Maybe that was why Viktor Nikiforov was enamored by her. Because she can surprise him just as much as he can surprise the audiences. Because she keeps him on his toes. Because she and he are cut from the same cloth._

_*_

_The clock is at four._

_The days with his mentors are like the stars. Innumerable (bickering), unforgettable, and simple unreachable by all other memories he once held dear._

_"Oh, did you think they grow on trees?" Yui laughs, retorting about what Yuri said about there being giant (ahem, big-assed) mushrooms on the mossy ground in the woods by the rink they were at._

_"Careful, now, Yui." Viktor slips a hand around her waist. "You wouldn't want to make our dear_ kouhai _to hate you now, would you?"_

_Yuri holds in snort. The only reason Viktor was referring to him as underclassman/protege in Japanese was to impress Yui._

_She sticks her tongue out at him. "You're one to talk," she shoots back. "I'm pretty sure he hates you more than he'll ever hate me!"_

_Yuri watches as they laugh and as Yui jabs Viktor between the ribs — who has the decency to not dodge — this time, and smiles._

_Indeed like stars._

_Then he hisses and makes an unattractive noise a of a swear and another hiss._ Yui is turning me into a poetic little shit.  _He thinks, scowling._

_*_

Yui watches the video Lutz, one of Yuko's triplets sent her. Two times. And then once more.

The first time, she makes herself watch it with clinical detachment, looking for errors, any errors. Any at all, but only finds part of the music she could've edited better. But nothing about him.

The second time, she lets herself be lost again. Lost again within each graceful stroke of the blades of the skates, each spin. Each lutz, and each jump, even each gesture of the slender hands, and those slim, long and graceful fingers. Each movement that contained something more than just what it looked. Each movement that tells the tales of bloody toes and bruised knees and countless hours of tears and sweat. Each movement with a meaning so powerful, each movement unique and perfect and wonderful in its own right. Monuments to be remembered within the icy, beautiful and treacherous kingdom he ruled, to be carved deep into the stone columns of time, and to be ingrained into the minds of all those that would follow.

She watches the video once more before she enters the airport. Because she needs something,  _anything_ , to reassure her that what she was doing was right. Was the choice she needs to make, and not another mistake that she would live to regret in her life.

But finally, she just smiles and closes the video and pulls up a tab from her history of an online sports magazine.

_Guess you aren't the only one playing truant, Yuri._

***

_But what the boy didn't expect was that just two years_ _after their meeting_ _,_ _one of_ _his mentor would be gone forever from the figure skating world._

_The clock stopped ticking at one._

Stopping its steady, soothing, comfortable rhythm. And taking one of the most celebrated figure skaters of the history and her era. Leaving nothing more than a legend. Nothing more than a tale. 

Indeed, the tragedy of skaters.

***

 


	5. three. "anhedonia."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SPEAK OF THE DEVIL AND HE SHALL COME!

It is raining when she gets back to Hasetsu.

The Katsuki family's onsen is nearer to the airport. But she hails a cab and tells the driver the address of her apartment.

Yui may not know whether she has made the right choice by coming back or not, but she knows one thing. She isn't ready. Isn't ready to face both Yuri and Viktor. Isn't ready to face either of the light haired devils she had come to know and love so well.

***

Viktor Nikiforov is like the spring. His kisses were dainty like the vibrant flowers of the grassy fields and the sapphire skies. And wild and full of fire as the passion flowers and as bold as the violet delphiniums, as delicate as they were. His touch is as gentle and as teasing the brief and crisp-smelling winds, and as warm and slow and trailing as the long bouts of sunlight and the fresh, morning laughters that were filled with crowns made of daisy's and the tiny, adorable, light blue forget-me-nots that he would bind into her hair and shower her with.

Viktor was the sun in the foggy mists that folds the daylight into a grey sphere. The flames of a cracklings hearth on a snowy day with the wind howling in her ears.

But no longer, could she reimagine his crip and sweet kisses, not even as she stared and looked and rewatched all of his performances, from since when he was just eleven. No longer, can she reconjure how he looked and how pleasant the weight of him was when he felt asleep on Yui's jeans-clad thighs, and half his face buried in her stomach. No longer, could she feel anything seeing things; about him, or not about him, anything related to him.

It was felt like she was freezing up, her visage and expression numbing, staring at the TV screen, her insides coating with ice. The cup of coffee in her hand didn't burn anymore. And the room was icy — not the exhilarating coldness brushed on a flushed cheek and the sore legs and toes that couldn't sit for a warm bath and comfortable bed, but the wet, slimy chill crawling up her back and heck that could only be described as  _loneliness_.

It wasn't thantophobia, the fear of being alone. She didn't feel that gut-squeezing, suffocating and heart wrenching fear or the sharpness of an imaginary welt building in her chest. 

 _Anhedonia,_  Yui realizes,  _recalls_ , wasn't as far-fetched as she once imagined it to be.

_The inability to feel pleasure._

***

It wasn't even an hour before the rhythmic, hurried banging on the door that was so clearly Minako's was heard.

"Hey," she opened the door and starts with a bored voice, half of her secretly snickering at the brunette's distress and half of her scolding herself for behaving this way in a situation like this. 

"Do you have  _any-hiccup idea-hiccup_ , of what you just did? I called your director- _hiccup_ , only for him to tell me that you said you were finishing your compositions- _hiccup_  back here!  _Hiccup_ ," then Yui realized she was drunk.

She glanced at the clock on the beige wall.  _Four. In the morning._

She sighs. She'd take a mad and  _un-drunk_  Minako over the psycho  _and_  drunk one.

***

"Sumimasen, Hiroki- _san_!" Yui huffs, "It's hard to drag a useless lump of meat around for four miles in the morning!"

Yuuri's mother smiled and took one of Minako's arms and some of her weight, giving Yui temporary relief before the two of them limped off, dragging a (still) passed out Minako with them. 

Toshio _-san_  bursts out laughing the minute they saw them. Hiroko sets Minako down to go over and does a rare thing: scold her husband. And then after reprimanding him, she turns to Yui. "Tea, dear?"

And so it begins. Before she left for skating and University, Yui would always come to the Katsukis' hot spring when she couldn't sleep and talk. But now, what they were doing was reminiscing of old days, before, when Yui had wobbled and tripped on the ice, before she became the beautiful swan she is now. Before she was looked as perfection itself in the eyes of the world and judged, and imitated for each action, each phrase, each look she presented and represented. 

Days before,  _before,_ she became the angel of ice, before she became the madonna of the keyboards. 

They turn on the TV sometime later in the night, but when a drunk Minako suddenly stirs, the channel makes a surprising shift from Men's Figure Skating even to Ladies'. 

"Russia's practically unbeatable now that you're retired, Yui!" She slurs, still drunk, gesturing wildly at the screen. Yui hides a snicker and then turns and pulls out her phone then snaps a quick photo.  _Perfect blackmail material._ She snickers. 

Toshio, seeing that Yui's mood had gradually changed from negative to better, stumbled off with a call over his shoulder saying he was going get tea for all of them to a now moaning Minako to the kitchen his wife had taken residence in. 

The door slams open. Yui ignores it, unconcerned, only letting out an internal sigh and mutters about the customers not being respectful enough to the old place and pokes Minako; once, twice.

The third time the brunette springs up for with surprising agility for someone as drunk as she is and glowers at her, trying to clock her. Yui snickers and ducks, then makes a comment about how slow Minako was, despite being a former world-classed dancer and that maybe age was catching up to her and she should stop drinking so much.

Minako starts screaming about how unfair it is that since Yui has martial arts training, she was more alert than Minako's current state then goes off and starts mumbling about how she was going to dissect Yui when she was no longer drunk with words that meant and reminded Yui more than it did to Minako. 

Someone stomps in Yui has by then opted to go on her phone rather than poking Minako — her self-preservation instincts and needs were stronger than her want for amusement. "Toshio- _sa_ _n_ , can yo—"

"Wh- A-" Someone starts in Russian, stammering.   
That wasn't Toshio, he didn't even sound like him. Yui turns.  " _Akaashi Yui!_ "

Her eyes wide, her throat closing, lungs suffocating. 

She murmurs in perfect Russian accent. 

_"Yuri."_

***


	6. four. "beyond the boundary."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I don't loose 90% of my readers because of this crappy chapter. I suck at writing reunions and like you know, general things.
> 
> i cri   
> y my writing so bad

 

_[Chapter Music](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ND_D8djH4s) _

_***_

_"If I left one day, what would you do?"_

_"I'd never forgive you."_

_But I wouldn't forget you, either._

_***_

It wasn't her skating that drew people to her. The way her body itself created the music. The sequence she edited her  _pieces._ It was her music. 

Always her music. 

She could hear music again. 

Yui really could hear music again. 

As clearly as she did when she first saw Viktor Nikiforov skate; the persistent notes of the piano, the combination of the techniques that revealed the stars, the sky and misty, snow-covered mountains behind it with the burning sun but a speck of gold in the distance, hidden by the curtain of grey. The soprano followed by the lower tenor, the accents, the sound. The slender hand of a shadow that pressed the keys, its visage hidden, only the long elegant hand that seemed to glide across the keys —  _flying_. The ever so gentle but so relentless; sudden pauses and accents surprising the audience, the notes so loud but the feel of the music so soft and syrupy and addicting. 

As clearly as she did when she saw Yuuri skate, the soft, uncertain chords of a blooming flower, reaching its prime. Violin and piano blending into one; soft landings, dainty jumps across a sparkling ice under a fading sky and the rich summer smell, enamoring and addicting with the notes gradually widening then backing down, the repeating the process with the gentleness of a pair of butterfly's wings, and then, finally, reaching its crescendo. 

The notes now were sudden, quiet — but a wisp and some tangles on the keys, frantic and hurried. The strings of the violin bound as tight as her own throat, as suffocating as the iron cage over her throat as her irises were blown wide, the feeling of wanting to run away or just collapse and apologize to them. Beg for their forgiveness.

But she can't. Because Yui has never had the bravery to go beyond the boundary. Unlike them.

Unlike Yuri.

Unlike Viktor.

***

He surprises her when he utters that sentence. "Coach me. Once more. Coach me again." He says.

"Teach me again.  _Please_."

***

"Hey."

"Hey?"

" _Hey_?!"

" _HEY?!_ "

****

"Mama," Says the three half-uncertain, half-snickering triplets. Axel tugs on her Yuko's sleeves. The three of them points towards the door. Which had been shut firm. "Go in — look."

Yuko paled dramatically. "Y-you didn't do anything..." She trails off. " _Did you_?"

They shook their head in unison and points toward the door again. "No, mama.  _Look_."

They seemingly try to shove their mother towards it. 

Yuko pushes the door open uncertainly and a pair of shrieking voices that greet her causes her to slam the door shut. Covering her ears. " _Takeshi_!" She screams, "What's going on in there?"

Her husband comes down with a grimace on his face. He says nothing. Only gestures for Yuuri and Viktor to come closer. "I don't know," He says with a shrug and sweat rolling down the side of his face. "They were already like this when I came in."

He opens the door cautiously.

" _WELL I ASKED YOU TO COME SO YOU COULD COACH ME. NOT WRITE SOME SAPPY ROMANCE SHIT!_ " They are greeted with the loud and angry voice of Yuri Plisetsky raging at someone else.

Yuuri furrows his brow. Who was Yuri yelling at?

" _WELL HONEY,_ " Someone,  _someone_  painfully familiar shrieks back. " _NOBODY IN HELL SKATES WITHOUT FEELINGS. IF YOU CAN'T_ _FEEL_ _IT, YOU CAN'T_ _SKATE_ _IT!_ " 

This was the most annoyed Yuko had heard her been in a long time. 

Yuko's eyes widen to the size of sunflowers as she flies past Yuuri, Takeshi and Viktor, who she had been hiding behind until now and stomps down towards the rink. "Yui?!" She screeches, with Yuuri following behind.

Her best friend stood on the ice with the blond boy, decked in a black jacket, jeans and a pair of navy skates. Yuko's lips part.

Suddenly, she remembers the raven-haired girl decked in a purple jacket at the edge of the rink playing a mini-sized piano on one hand. The notes so clear and crisp that Yuko could taste them. Like the fresh, red and gigantic apples Yui had loved so much that were harvested in autumn. The notes that were played with so much emotions that it wasn't just the skating, the spins and twirls and Lutz's that told a story, but carved, engraved into each chord and each each measure that revealed a tale, a myth, a  _legend_ , of all the hardships she went through. 

For a moment they stared each other. 

Another pair of footsteps. 

"Ah," Viktor Nikiforov smiles dazzlingly, completely unaffected by the fact that his former lover was right in front of him and yelling (not to mention being yelled) at by his fifteen-year-old pupil. "You were trying to teach Yurio that combination quad Salchow you used to do, right?"

***

Yui wishes the ground just would swallow her whole.  _He_  was standing here in front of her. The juniper green jacket, dark jeans, fringe of silver hair covering his clear eyes. 

_His eyes._

Yui wants to cry. 

She could still hear the music. The crescendo. The violin's note strung so high that she feels as if the strings would break, and the hand she sees clutching the neck of the violin — strangling her own as well — would shatter the wood. 

 _Those eyes_. 

Those blue eyes that seemed to look at her the same way they did two years ago. The same way Yuri's gem green ones had looked at her. Asking her, question her,  _demanding_  her to tell them whether or not the way she had asked them that question was so that if she leaves—  _when_  she leaves, they'd have the closure to the fact that Yui regretted it.

_But you left, didn't you? You didn't want to leave. But you did._

_This is the least you could do for them._

Yui raises an eyebrow and forces a snicker from her throat, suddenly grateful for the fact that Yuuri had been such a fumbling idiot since they were kids that it actually sound natural with the last twenty years of practice. "If I wanted to do that I would've just tossed him into the closet and lock it with a bunch of discs of my old routines and throw away the keys." She retorts, her expression dead panning. 

She could hear the notes shattering. 

For once, her retorts weren't accompanied by a wide smile, which showed Yuko exactly how 'irritated' her best friend was at the entire situation. 

He smiles. "Good point, Yui _-chan_ ," she sees how Yuko tries not to choke on her spit. "Good to see you again!"

Yui grins back. "Long time no see,  _Vitya_." Her heart clenches painfully. 

The others stare at them. 

_Was this how normal ex's always act?!_

***

Yui glanced towards the darkened sky, her footfalls almost silently except for her shoes' impact on the sloshing sand. The waves rolled towards her gently, the city lights were dim, fading. She could still see the Hasetsu Castle and the rink glimmering faintly in the distance. The banners of the ridiculous idea the twins and Viktor had about 'Hot Spring On Ice' rolled down from the top of the building. The posters were plastered practically  _everywhere_  in Hasetsu. 

The event involving the three of them;  _the_  Viktor Nikiforov, Yuri Plisetsky and Yuuri Katsuki was already making big news in sports gossip and tabloids all around the world. If they were to find Yui there as well...

She grimaced.  _Everything would completely explode._

Yui raises her arms to the back of her head and leans on them, staring at the stars in the night sky.  _Wish upon a star..._  There were so many stars in the Hasetsu sky. But it was summer, and the Hasetsu nights were not dark. And only the stars that seemed to be closer to her were visible, and she bet, if she tried to count them now, she might actually get the digits. The shadows of the outlines of the lone mountains at the edge of the sky were still visible with hints and traces of the cheery blush and smears of paint from the long gone sun. The water of the sea blending in, a part of the already endless sky.

But beyond the boundary of the physical realm, there were only dark, lonely nights and red moons of misery and bitterness and the demons of the past, haunting and crying.

*** 

Only Minako had seen the sharp and hardened edge of ice and bitterness inside Viktor Nikiforov's azure blue eyes.

The disbelief and barely controlled rage darkening Yuri Plisetsky's clear emerald pools.

And the misty, contaminated fog of uncertainty and distracted way Yui Akaashi's grey irises clouded up.

 


	7. five. "beautiful heist."

She is told she plays with a silent easiness, and a quiet passion. 

Yui knows better; she does not play. All that remains in her heart is the beat of a silent drum, and the dying embers of a flickering flame.

***

_It is those that smile and caress you should be wary of, instead of those that bite and snarl their discontent freely and unconcerned._

***

Had Viktor Nikiforov ever loved her?

 _Truly_  loved her?

 _Affannato_ ; anguished.  _Acciaccato_ ; broken down, crushed.

Those are but two of the emotions she conveys into the black and white keys until her forehead lines with sweat, her fingers numb, her lungs gasping for air and her chest working with it in harmony, heaving in desperate breaths and lips pulled in to a wince of pain.

Numbly, she makes the stride from the study to her bedroom and stumbles onto the soft comforter, and shifts to wrap the chilled cotton blankets around her body; mind blank, eyes dry and lids warm with exhaustion. The inky grasps of sleep and avoidance of the world offering a welcoming cocoon of warmth and safety. 

And so she sleeps, heart bitter, body tired, mind restless, and weary of the enigma that is Viktor Nikiforov to the bone.

***

Sleeps, and  _remembers_. 

The cold mornings of St. Petersburg, the bitter, black coffees accompanied by laughing blue eyes. The sharp retorts of a boy with angry green eyes. The black sequins of a sparkling dress, the long, ivory and violet colored, wide sleeves showing off pale and lithe limbs. The clean skates and the sparkling ice. The audience, the music, the notes. Purple sparks, navy lights, shimmering white flashes of the cameras from the sides. 

_Limbs sore, foot bruised, dead tiredness. Frozen fingers._

And an undeniable sense of satisfaction.

In sleep, Yui asks herself.  _How could I have ever left that stage?_

But even in sleep, she knew that answer. 

_Because I couldn't._

_Because that stage was_ _never_ _for_ _me._

***

There aren't many people who knew who Yui really was.  _Is_. 

In the eyes of the public, she was once the star of the ice, alongside her lover; the living legend Viktor Nikiforov, only to suffer a terrible tragedy and resigned from her throne, and abandoning her kingdom, crown and lover, but then became the star under another spotlight, and begun another golden age in another industry under her reign. 

To her friends, partners and colleagues, she was the teasing, (only  _sometimes_ sadistic), loyal-to-a-fault, sarcastic girl whose parents passed away when she was five and was taken in by her mentor and grandparents and was a absolute  _genius_ , a gem in a sea of rocks and dust; a genius made by the heavens who continued on from her small hometown in Japan, to become one of the most well known figures in the world.

But in the end.  _She_  didn't know who herself was. 

But—

That was better than letting the fame go to her head, wasn't it?

***

Viktor has been avoiding her: she could tell. But unfortunately, it wasn't like they could entirely cease to exist to the other — it was simply too big a task for a town as small as Hasetsu for two of its most famous guests ( _ever_ ) and the exception of another two returning ones as well. Besides, she had to take in account that Yuri was practically trying to glare her to death, but still beggi—  _demanding_  that Yui kept coached him. 

Thinking back, she realized that the reason Yakov looks much older than his actual age was probably (most definitely) because of the two headstrong and stubborn pupils he's had to mentor. Besides, not mentioning it seems that  _Yuuri_  has also done a fair amount of begging (actual,  _legit_ begging, unlike  _someone_ ) about who was going to write the composition for the winner's routines.

So it seems that both her and Viktor's plan about avoiding each other failed dramatically and  _tragically—_ much like how their reunion turned out. Yui had been berating Yuuri when Viktor had walked in, followed by an indignant Yuri. 

And it just so turned out that the reason both Yui and Yuri were so mad was because of the same thing; feelings. 

 _Oh Lord_. 

Yui really didn't want to know how this would turn out.

***

She should have known when Viktor was answering Yuri so charmingly (even more so than usual) about something while walking in her direction with powerful steps.

But she didn't. The newest volume of the shoujo manga that Minako bribed her with to train her miserable bastard of a  _kouhai_  had actually been an autographed copy, and it was  _so damn good_. 

Maybe good enough that she didn't see an a hundred and eighty centimeters of silver hair and blue eyes and smiling lips striding purposefully towards her. 

And of course, her position worked against her; she had been leaning against one of the rink's wall, flipping through the book, and he had taken the novel from her fingers so swiftly that she didn't realize what was going on until a hot breath was fanning her cheek, and a hand pinned beside her hair, another by her hips, trailing dangerously close, trapping her between strong arms. The book laid abandoned on the benches somewhere near by, but the proximity was messing with her ability to think properly.

And off the note, not lying, and being completely honest, Yui's had her fair share of men trying to seduce her.

But this,  _this_  was different. A pair of cerulean eyes covered by the a shiny pearly color of his hair, contrasting sharply and bringing out his eyes. 

He still made her breathless.

And he was staring at her lips. 

Briefly, Yui felt a jolt of pain in her chest and a dollop of heat in her stomach. 

She was still attracted to him. Perhaps they weren't in love as Viktor had made them seem for all those years before, she wanted them to be that couple again. To be able to counter his flirtatious advances with her own. 

Because Yui is selfish. She is every bit as selfish as Viktor Nikiforov. She wants every bit and piece of every single heart in this world, just solely for the reason she  _can_. She  _would_.   
Because like Viktor, she can't settle for second best; it was either all or nothing. She won't take   only a sliver, a single slice. Yui is selfish; she wants,  _needs_  to reclaim every part of Viktor Nikiforov's mind and soul and body as she once had, to be able to slide her hands up to his visage then intertwine them behind his neck. To retrace the lines across his chest as she had done for the mornings of eight years before the past two. But at the very same time she wanted to be selfless, to give up her desires so Viktor could have his, to chase his dreams he had abandoned for hers. 

_Beautiful heist._

_Thief; he was stealing her heart._

But they were close; so, so close. It feels so intimate, like she could reach up and tug a handful of the glimmering hair and bring his lips to hers. And maybe,  _maybe_ , it would feel like as it had as their first, nine years— nearly ten, ago, maybe he would still taste as he did practically a decade before; smooth lips, the taste of the fruity, sweet lip palm and of the winter, the cold, the thrill of being on the ice. Or maybe it would be still warm, toasty, and slightly bitter from the coffee he liked as it did when they still shared the ice. 

She hears the the slight  _sh_  of fabric brushing against fabric and realizes he had slipped a knee between her legs, and for a moment she looks up and sees his eyes, and she sees flashes of the strained self control she has in hers, and the fire licking his pupils, and sees his eyelids are half closed and the sliver of blue hooded.

His hand slides down to her wrist, while his right moves to her chin, tipping it even closer to his face.

God. She wants to kiss him.

She  _needs_  to.

His fingers are smooth on her visage. Its tips freezing, she briefly wonders whether it was because of being on the ice, or whether it was something else. But it was so  _Viktor_  that she couldn't help the emotions welling up her throat; even when she knows they may have been real in the first place. His finger presses on the bottom of her lips.

 _Christ,_  this man was going to be the death of her. 

"Yuuri and Yurio are having trouble  _feeling,_ " he accents the word  _feel_. She stops a shiver from trailing down her spine. Her breath is caught in her throat. His voice; pitched low, sweet as the call of the sirens. Meant to be used between sheets and bare skins, warm and small spaces where there it was wonderland for only two. "Why don't we give them a lesson or two on  _exactly_  how to show emotions?" He purrs then steps back, and just like that, he breaks the spell he had been casting, giving Yui just enough time to see Yuuri's frantically blushing face and Yuri's angry red face behind Viktor's smiling, triumphant one. 

If she wasn't so flustered herself, she would've made a snarky comment about how the two of them looked like what happened after a tomato and an apple had sex together.

But, Yui was Yui. And Yui  _never_  says jokes or insults that would backfire in her face — perhaps she should use her  _geniusness_  for something more useful; like world domination or helping the poor. But then if Yui was really as smart as her IQ tests say she is, then well, Yui wouldn't have stepped anywhere  _near_  Japan with Viktor in it.

The bastard is smirking her now. 

"So, how about it?" His tone is teasing, like what happened two seconds ago didn't just affect him as much as it did her. 

Viktor Nikiforov wants to get under her skin.

And Yui Akaashi would be damned if she let him.

 


	8. six. "graceful deception."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GAHHHHH SUCH AN AWFUL CHAPTER !!!!!!
> 
> my name is no sleep , how do you do?
> 
> status; still craving ice cream, i've been reading and re-reading this chapter because there are so many words, and i feel a lot of them are unnecessary .
> 
> AND i'm sorry to say i was HONESTLY NOT feeling it when i wrote this.
> 
> i mean seriously. DONALD FUCKING TRUMP got voted to white house.
> 
> LIKE LITERALLY WHAT THE FUCK
> 
> okay rant over. not really
> 
> #thankgodiliveincananda

_Beyond the looking glass, do you long for me,_

_as I had for you?_

***

She had stumbled out of the rink, flustered, after snatching up her manga with a huff.

Honestly. Who the fuck does he think he is?

For a moment, Yui contemplates on just storming out of Hasetsu like the self-absorbed bitch everyone else seemed to think she was, but by just staring at Viktor Nikiforov like a blind rat, she had involuntarily just accepted his offer.

Besides, Viktor knows. Him asking her to do that was technically challenging her to a competition — between the two of them, which one was the better coach, and there was no way in hell she could refuse him — her ego was way too big to just not accept it.

So naturally, after locking her book and other personal items in a locker, Yuko finds a disgruntled Yui asking to lend her some of Yuko's old skating attire. So Yuko gives her best friend the outfit as smoothly as a robot and stares at the woman she's known since she was seven with wide eyes and an open mouth.

She was going to regret this after.

***

Yui doesn't really know anymore. The blue skates (that Yuko kept no matter how many times before Yui had told her to throw out) Yui had worn since she was fourteen, by some miracle, seemed to still fit. She didn't know whether to be grateful or disdained that Yuko had kept them.

  
Anticipation and nerve streamed through her veins.

Indeed, she was retired, not crippled, and she still practiced... Sometimes. But it had been months since she took to the ice, and if Viktor wanted her to think up of a routine that matched perfectly with his, she was undeniably out of practice.

Besides, the difference in some things were clear. Viktor had only left the stage weeks ago, while Yui left skating altogether two year before, unwilling to even touch her skates for eight months after her retirement before finally relenting after another two months of self-pity and wallowing to look at videos of their former routines.

 _So this is how Yuuri always felt like_. To be compared. To be doubted. To fear the thoughts and opinions of the audience.

Ah, it was, indeed, the obnoxious ones that excelled at handling fame and nerves.

***

Skating was a bitch sometimes. So was Yui.

The main difference was that skating was only sometimes a bitch, while Yui was _always_ one.

But being a bitch or not sometimes meant landings that jump or receiving that gold medal.

So if being a bitch for a little longer was going to help her beat Viktor Nikiforov, she'd be one as long as she need to.

***

Yui glided out of the changing rooms with a mega-watt smile that matched Viktor's own head on.

"Wow," snarled Yuri, bitter, bitter, little Yuri. "You're actually gonna skate?"

She smiles. Smiles the smile that had before, alongside Viktor's own version of the smile that had annoyed Yuri to unfathomed depths for years. " _Yuri_ ," she practically beams, unlike the flustered self she was just minutes ago and ruffles his blond hair, laughing charmingly. "There's a clear difference between being retired and crippled." Those words hold more bitterness than she intends to.

Before Yuri could retort with his poisonous tongue, Viktor's delighted voice rings across the rink.

"Ah, Yui-chan! I see you're ready!" He skates over. Movements more fluid and show off than usual. "Come on," he gestures to her.

_So this was how he wanted to play it?_

_Sure._

Yui steps onto the ice with ballerina grace and stands beside the Russian man.

"I'm glad you decided to accept my offer," Viktor smiles, as if knowing the amount of pain she took in deciding to stay. "I guess you already know what I'm going to ask you to skate with me."

She does, even before Viktor said those words, she knew what he was going to ask them to skate.

It was a memory.

A memory mixed alongside all the other of the nearly nine years they had shared together alongside the two other they had with Yuri.

The memory, tangled with the others; some intimate — to be remembered with in the bedroom and soft comforters and silk blankets. The memory to be remembered with the delighted laughs and dark hair amidst the bright wildflowers of American summer. The memories to be remembered with the delicately prepared and flavoured variety breakfasts Yakov would always yell at them and Yuri for having too much of. The memories to be remembered alongside those of failure and defeat, those of victory and triumphs, those of happiness and disappointment, and most of all, those of love and loss.

The routine that had won them the Olympic gold medal for pair skating five years ago.

The routine that was the perfect combination of Eros; passionate, sexual, intoxicated, and Agape; pure, unconditional, endearing.

Swan Lake.

***

_And in your dreams..._

_Who was I?_

*** 

She doesn't want to touch him.

She doesn't want to touch those lovely, marble crafted limbs and careful hands, to touch him and remember the ways she had once been intoxicated by it.

But she did. Because she could never back down from a competition of pride.

Yui doesn't know whether to laugh or cry.  Or maybe she should be grateful.

Because if Yuuri hadn't gotten last place in the Grand Prix, if Yui hadn't ditched her original concert back in Germany, if Minako hadn't started banging on her apartment door in the middle of the night and made her accompany her back to Yu-topia, and if Yuri hadn't yelled at her to coach him again...

Because fate was cruel.

Because Viktor is cruel.

Because Yui had loved Viktor once upon a time — because perhaps Viktor hadn't, but Yui could judge that her own were real.

He takes her hand and smiles. His hands are warm, but Yui feels cold. So cold. For them the ice is supposed to be warm. Yui feels like she could freeze to death right there. The hand moves from hers to her back, an arm draped from her shoulders. She feels warmer, another arm, this time around her neck, pressing her face into his chest. It was warm. Yui feels like Yui again, she inhales and carves the musk that is undeniably Viktor Nikiforov's and engraves it in her memories, and breaks out of the embrace.

_I'm ready._

***

The music starts, and for the first time in a long while, Yui is the one on the ice, instead of being the one watching the person on the ice. Her mind slows, and for a second she panics, thinking she forgot the routine until she hears the soft scraps of the skating blades across the ice. Her feet was moving and guiding her, and a part of her wants to insult her own legs, but another part won out and she follows it.

He lets go of her hand. Yui is relieved.

They look at each other for a moment, Yui doesn't think she could've bared anything longer than that, and starts, then reconnects their fingers for another moment, and skates.

And if Yui closes her eyes, she could've sworn she'd see another Viktor, smiling that familiar, endearing smile she had fallen in love with. She continues, because right now, there was only the two of them. Yui didn't leave Viktor or skating, Viktor didn't resent her for her cowardice and indecision. For a moment, she was that sixteen year old Japanese-Canadian, the raven haired girl with grey eyes. For a moment he was the charming, carefree Viktor Nikiforov Yui had first met during his second year in the senior bracket. For a moment they were Agape; the agape, the love, the emotion that Yuri failed to replicate, to feel; unconditional, pure, undying, never-ending.

Her arm around the back of his neck, sliding down to his shoulders. Her legs tucked under his, her hand pressed to his cold face.

The man, the beautiful greek statue of a man.

Every muscle, every crevice, and every fibre of his body that was she had once explored.

She _has_ him.

_Oh god._

_She has him_.

There was only them; Romeo and Juliet. The beautiful illusion the two of them had put up to protect themselves from the pain of being hurt again. The graceful deception the two of them created that made the world cry. They were each their own Pygmalion that had fallen in love with the beautiful statue they had carved out of ice.

She does close her eyes. Because in her memories, the ice, the ice and Viktor, were still as beautiful as it ever was.

The music shifts. Yui recognizes the melody. It was another piece that one day, five years ago she had came across randomly shifting through the collections of pieces of an old mentor.

The mood changes dramatically.

Now, it became Eros; in all its flaming glory. His hand under her chin, pressing a swift, bare kiss to edge of her fingertips and begun guiding her deeper and deeper into the routine.

His eyes, alive with a fervor and a passion she was all too familiar with. Hands warm, against her waist, guiding her. Another twirl. More jumps; another axel; another lift, each accompanied by intricate footwork and emotions that stretched out in a maze around them. She is a new Yui and an old version of herself. She could be another, better, more emotional angel of ice. She could still be that old, teenage, lovestruck Yui.

Her chest was warm, and her heart burning with a feeling she thought she had lost long before.

Elegant, sincere, serene. The music is wild and untamed, but Yui has never felt more of that indescribable feeling of home and longing. Those crisp notes and perfectly balanced harmony. And so they move, as one, with all the finesse and technique as two of the formerly most celebrated couples of their world.

The feeling that reminds her of the beautiful Canadian springs and summers she had spent with her parents' in their Canadian summer home, the sunlight shinning through green leaves of the oak trees and the fresh smell of the rain after a stormy night. The dollops of raindrops on the ivies that her father had always tried stopped her mother from trimming. The sound of her mother singing and her father's terrible, monstrosity of an accompaniment on the violin he had found in his grandmother's attic when he was a boy.

There is sweat dripping down the side of their face as they finish. Yui's chest feels wide, like the open space of a million summer skies. Like she had taken the first inhale of fresh air after a lifetime of stifled ones. The absolute purity and clarity of the breath as she glanced to the one that still had her in his arms. Their eyes met; one a cloudy grey and the other a clear blue.

The sweat clinging to the silver hair and the utterly exhausted look in his eyes did nothing but increase her feeling of euphoria and strengthening her want. She didn't need it, but only she knew how much she wanted it.

That moment after the performance where your legs were sore and your clothes were freezing to the touch and hair loose from jumps after jumps.

And as if to torture her — to torture the both of them more, he leans down. He leans and presses a kiss so close to the edge of her mouth that she wants to tilt her head so he would just kiss her. So he would just hold her in his arms and she could just do as she had in the memories all of which had become her kryptonite for the past two years that had haunted her dreams every single night.

His lips are smooth, and for a moment: for a moment. She think she hears him.

" _Lubov moya_ ," she thinks she hears those words.

_My love._

***

 


	9. seven. "september rain."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay first of all, i apologize for the late update. because a really important exam of mine is coming up, i've been studying non-stop for the past two weeks.
> 
> and again, i love those angst books, but like idk how to write those deep scenes, so i apologize if this really bored you.
> 
> and i think what i'm gonna do for reaching 500 (nearly 600 now) votes is that i'm going to open this contest;
> 
> which is pretty much, a contest for a one shot for Yui x Viktor, like it could be in Viktor's perspective, or when Yui was still skating... you know, the stuff. and for the winners, i'll write a Viktor x Reader one shot for you between 1000-2000 words long.
> 
> so, tell me in the comments if you'd like me to do this.
> 
> by the way, there might be entries on other sites that i publish on, so winners could be anywhere between 1-5, with 5 being the absolute maximum unless i find a really good one and decide to change my mind.
> 
> sayonara!
> 
>  
> 
> okay. onto patches of ice.

Yuri lost. 

After that, Yui couldn't touch the piano for a week.

Suddenly, it felt like the life she had left before, and the one she currently had were clashing together, each seeking to be the one that ultimately became hers. If that stunt Viktor and Yui pulled the month before  _Hot Spring on Ice_ , didn't already shake her to the core and break her heart, then Yuri's face; that look; the look of a lost child (an abandoned one, in a sense) had —the exact same expression he had on the day she had retired after her last — narrowly won medal.

Yui wasn't going to yell at Yuri for winning. She wasn't going to glare at Yuuri on the internet half a world away either. She wasn't going to be jealous of the fact that Yuuri had,  _probably,_  won Viktor Nikiforov's heart, fair and square, and with Viktor, probably win the Grand Prix as well. 

After all, she already has four crowns that tells her, she is—  _was_ , the best in the world. 

But that was just the thing, wasn't it? She already  _has_  four. Any other skater, perhaps those that didn't even  _like_  skating, or maybe not even  _sports_ , would kill to be in her place and have the recognition and success she has. 

Yui had been satisfied.

She just didn't know when she stopped being satisfied.

She didn't know when skating stopped giving her that edge and thrill and rush of adrenaline she loved and craved.

***

_Did you ever think we would end up,_

_here,_

_of all the places?_

***

She started writing for Yuuri the second week after his showoff with Yuri. 

Without much success.

***

Another afternoon Yui had wasted half of, sitting, and staring idling staring at blank sheets.

Taking a walk outside was probably  _way_  more productive than what she was doing.

The snow and ice she loved so much melts, and soon, it became almost like spring. Like Vancouver, the seagulls, the salty air, the pastel colored blooms slowly becoming richer colors amidst the dewy grass, moistened by the rain the night before.

How Yui loved the rain. 

The feeling of the cold, wet jeans sticking to her legs, the frenzy of raindrops splitting into more drops on her hand. The powerful gust of wind that sometimes carry them to her windows, falling onto the clear panes of the glass window. The soft, crisp, fresh smell after a storm. The warm, summer showers; the freezing, winter hail storms. Rain is meant to wash and cleanse people of their sins, of their pains. The calm after the storm; the rainbows she would try to chase as a child, the soft kisses of the droplets if water on her jaw. The way it's path made intricate lines, as if it knew of and understood the hardships and blood and tears of the past and the future.

She loves the rain, just as the rain loved her.

"You're very cheerful today, Yui." A voice interrupts her. 

Viktor stands there, smiling. 

She walks down to the beach he stood at.

 It seemed colder down by the ocean than it was on the stone path she had been on minuets prior. They both sat on the low edge of the stone wall.

"Before we begin," she says. "I think we should both agree that neither Yuuri nor Yurio will be affected by our relationship. Am I right?" 

He smiles. "Spot on, I was thinking the same thing." Then, he looks to the gray skies. "Things really have changed, haven't they?"

The waves roar, bits of water fly up. "They have. Exactly  _what_  do you want with Yuuri, Viktor?" Her eyes harden. 

He sweeps the fringe of silver hair from his eyes. The mood turns. "Exactly what you wanted, Yui." He takes her hand. "The exact thing you have been searching for ever since you left," he holds her hand to his chest. 

She burns and freezes at the same time. 

His chest muscles are solid and well-defined, as they've always been. She can feel the steady beating in his chest, whereas, the inside of hers, were hollow and numb. 

Yui withdraws her hand. Viktor isn't hurt. Nor is he surprised. Yui found it hard to touch the other. And she was especially keen on avoiding contact with all exposed skin. Contact should be limited. Especially with the type of separation they had.

Their separation was so ugly she doesn't want to remember it. 

"You suck." Yui blurts out truthfully as the clouds clear to reveal a shy sun, she blinks, soaking up the warmth. 

" _E-eh?!_ " This time, Viktor's head turns so fast, for a moment she's scared he'd snap his neck, then he relaxes and leans forward and rests his hand on his knees. "That was mean, Yui- _chan_." He laughs.

Viktor glances above. "Oh, seagulls. I never thought I'd miss their cries, so early in the morning back in St. Petersburg — I never thought I'd leave." He then looked at her. "Don't you miss something, Yui? Anything at all?"

Yes, she does. But she's always had a family with Hiroko, Toshio and Yuko and Yuuri and Nishigori. She wouldn't trade them for anyone or anything else. Not for the ice, not even for the times she had spent together with Viktor and Yuri. 

"No. Nothing." She stares straight ahead.

Viktor lets out a laugh, "Yuuri is right, you never glance back." For a moment, he almost sounded melancholy. "You know, Yui, Yuuri said something to me today, just before you came that I think you'd want to hear."

_"Well, Yuuri, did you never seek to tell any of these to close friends?" Viktor asks Yuuri, who had tucked his knees into his chest, looking lost._

_"No," Yuuri shakes his head, then looks away. "Actually, once or twice."_

_"With who?" Viktor couldn't help but prod._

_"_ Senpai _." Yuuri says, unseeing of the fact that Viktor's head shot up, he continued talking. "But it was only once or twice, about my nerves. But not anymore."_

_"Why?"_

_"It was because... I didn't want to burden_ senpai _with my own trouble._ Senpai _was always someone, something, I've looked up to, beside you. And she was just so amazing; in school, on the piano, skating... And she didn't have nerves either. She was always just so calm and confident you felt like you could depend on her for anything."_

_"But you didn't," Viktor marveled in realization. "Because you didn't want to taint her image for helping someone as pathetic as you?"_

_Yuuri looks down, and for a moment, Viktor feels bad for what he's said. "Yes," Yuuri finally answers. "That's part of it. But even if I didn't want to ruin_ senpai _'s reputation, there were a lot of other people who needed their help, and their problems were more serious. She might not look like it, but she worked the hardest out of all of us. Keeping up with us through pure willpower. Even now, it wouldn't be the first time she's collapsed from sheer exhaustion."_

Viktor smiles at her, eyes crinkling, the sunlight reflecting on his silver hair, making him look like a angel.  _Maybe he was one._ "And then he said, " _Senpai_  is someone I look up to, I want to be worthy to stand beside someone like her."

He continues. "What we're all saying is that you should stop fighting the battle alone. But with other people who love you, beside you. And I'd like to be one of them."

Yui couldn't hold back a scoff this time. "Yeah, as what?"

"A father figure? A friend— you brother? Your boyfriend then." 

" _Shut the hell up! You're so full of shit!_ "

***

"My name is Viktor Nikiforov," he sounds exactly as he had, so long ago. He looked as he had too, hand outstretched, smiling.

"Yui. Akaashi, Yui." She was sixteen again. Glancing up at the man who's skating had just won him one of his first crowns.

"Nice to meet you." 

Their hands stay clasped for a moment longer. Until—

"Viktor,  _senpai_!  _I finally found you_!" A huffing Yuuri races down the path and leaps right into Yui's arms.

He scrambles away not a second after.

Yui laughs. And both Viktor and Yuuri stares at her, she walks up to Yuuri, and for a second he flinches, and she's guilty, but then she pulls him up and they're okay and Yui's patting his head. "Good luck."

Yuuri beams and this time barrels towards her in a hug she accepts gladly. " _Arigatou_!"

Yui doesn't think she would trade that moment; the warmth of the sun and Yuuri, and the steady beat of Viktor's heart that was still on the edge of her fingertips, her breath clear in the cool air. And Yuuri's smile, the one she thought she would never see again, after the competition Yuuri was brutally beaten in, and brought down. 

Their was a crack in the ice around her heart. And for today, Yui think she prefers the sun over the rain. The rays of light cutting across her pale skin, the comfortable warmth that wasn't provided by a burning flame. And the days she had spent before, just the sun, her, and him.

"Come on,  _senpai_!" An overjoyed Yuuri shouts, while Viktor gestures for her to hurry up, still smiling gently.

The sudden prickling of tears surprises even herself. She inhales a lungful of the fresh.

_Oh Yuuri._

"Coming!" She calls.

_September..._

Her and Viktor's final season.

***

 


	10. eight. "infelicitous."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DON'T WORRY I'M GETTING BACK INTO IT.
> 
> PLEASE EXCUSE THIS CHAPTER
> 
> I WILL EDIT IT LATER
> 
> *BOWS 90º*
> 
> mannnnn, yui's always so unhappy. :(
> 
> AHHHHHH
> 
> YUIIII I'M SORRY YOU'RE ALWAYS SAD
> 
> PLEASE FORGIVE ME
> 
> Patches of Ice will recommence tomorrow, expect an update then.

_How unfortunate we were..._

_Loving you was the most exquisite f_ _orm_ _of self—_  
_destruction._

_***_

Yui really has  _nothing_  to say about the districts. Considering how sucky and cranky Yuuri was at the beginning. It was decent, if they weren't counting about the sudden urge Yuuri had to kiss the wall at the.

And  _that_  was not counting the huge fuss Minako made and had talked off her ear about Viktor and her being a bigger deal than the skaters themselves. Besides, it wasn't like the anything thing was  _her_ fault. All  _she_  wore was a pair of jeans and a sweater. But.  _But_. Thanks to the man who has no sense of shame or have any reserve  _whatsoever_ , Viktor, on the other hand, decided to wear a freaking'  _suit_. Yui'd bet half of the fortune that she made from skating Viktor would wear pajamas when he would be  _supposed_  to wear suits. And the was Minako rambled about Yuuri...

_It was like she had a student complex for Yuuri or something..._

That was the end of their training in Hasetsu.

It was the Cup of China that Yui was worried about. Since he was never a confident skater, Yuuri was never even close to being regarded as 'world-class' as Viktor and Yui was, so he was never once a direct competitor or rival of any of the skaters there:  _especially_  not Christophe Giacometti. She remembers seeing the man — who was once a boy at one of Viktor's crown-reciveing performances she happened to be at, supporting a Japanese skater that was on her Olympics team. The then Christophe had just deputed in the senior division, and Yui would never forget the way his hazel eyes sparkled after Viktor had thrown a magenta tulip (or whatever flower it had been) at him and a smile.

Christophe was probably the best in the current figure skating world now that Viktor had retired. However he had been unmotivated because Viktor had retired. Although, Yui was afraid that he'd actually get even more excited than when he competed against Viktor (a battle which he never won) when he got wind of the fact that he'd be skating against Viktor's student.

_What would Yuuri do if he lost?_

***

Yui hissed as she crossed her legs in the First Class lounge. Minako was texting her random nonsense for the last half hour before takeoff. Like that wasn't enough, Viktor had complained for days about the seating when he heard that he and Yuuri would be flying in Business, she, however, was in First Class and called him poor. But in truth, the reasons, split fifty-fifty, why she had bought the First Class ticket was to be  _away_  from Viktor Nikiforov and to be  _near_  where they had the best wifi. Actually no. The percentages was  _twenty_ percent away from Viktor and  _thirty_ percent with wifi. And the rest fifty was still about Giacometti.

Yui leaned back against the headrest of the seat and exhaled softly. The lounge was empty; there weren't a lot of people in Kyushu who could afford First Class, and those that could (which admittedly, there weren't a lot either) wouldn't have made their destination Kyushu; considering if there  _were_ , Kyushu wouldn't be as small as it is, and Viktor Nikiforov coming here wouldn't have been as big of a news.

 _Ping! Ping! Ping!_  Three rings of her phones sounded off in succession. 

It was Minako.

Yui scowled.  _What does the old hag want now?_ After texting her about athlete and celebrity gossip before abruptly changing topics to the best skate wear that was ever worn in competitions by her and Viktor.  

Minako: _YUiiiiiii!!!!!!!!! DID YOU SEE IT_

There was a link was attached. By the looks of it, it was a Google search result. 

Minako: _DID YOU SEE IT_

The link was attached ten more times.

Minako:  _SERIEOUSLY_

Minako: _YUI!!!!!!!!!_

Yui felt an irk mark forming. The damn woman was taking up her storage, she'd waste precious money replying back to her. With a sigh, she clicked the link. 

She still doesn't know whether she should have or not.

***

_"You know we'll be the biggest news right after you and Yuri being in Hasetsu, right?"_

***

They weren't.

Turns out, she were even bigger news than Yuri and Viktor;

_YUI AKAASHI, VIKTOR NIKIFOROV, UNITED AGAIN?_

_-Sports Monthly_

@officialskating_news:  _Is one of the most celebrated figure couples of the century making their return?_

Her mouth dropped open. Tapping the news section, she clicked on the first video, also the ones with the most views and comments.

" _Honestly, it makes more sense for Yui Akaashi to be in Hasetsu more than Viktor Nikiforov and Yuri Plisetsky,"_ one of the English speaking hosts on the American sports news channel Yui just happened to stop on said _. "Kyushu is, after all, both her and Yuuri Katsuki's hometown. And besides, it is a hard time for Katuski, finishing last in last year's Grand Prix, and it has been confirmed by both that they were friends prior to the Grand Prix._ " 

@nikiforovfan23984:  _you don't honestly think that viktor would get back with that_ _bitch, right?! i mean come on, hoe dumped him and left skating!_

@lemony_snickett1736:  _i hope yui would come back. i really miss her skating!!!!! there are no good skaters these days, after she left_

@idon'tcareaboittheworld:  _who cares, the world's sure a lot more exciting now that these two have made their moves. ULTIMATE FACE OFF_

@lindasthebest:  _@idon'tcareaboittheworld_

_shut up and f*** off  
_

The four comments were followed by  _millions_  in similar format, all discussing whether they still a couple, whether they were going to skate again, and others dissing peoples comments or just trying to stir up a storm by commenting random rumors.

Yui glances out at the dark Hasetsu sky she would not see in months, contemplating, feeling a sudden loss and a gaping hole in her stomach she hadn't felt since the bout of anger in the Hasetsu rink. The whole world was already in turmoil when he had them in his hands. Now they were even more chaotic and loss without him pulling their strings and tugging them along. She was not saved nor excused.

But the question stayed on her mind.

_If Yuuri lost. What would happen then?_

***

Yui leaned her face onto the cold railings of overlooking a highway in Beijing, her earphones digging into her ears. Her jacket gave her no protection against the cold; seeping through the skin, untying the knots of warmth the coffee and bun had offered her. 

In Beijing, you couldn't see the stars. 

_Feel the warmth,_

_W_ _e’ll never die,  
_

But Beijing was beautiful in its own way. The city lights are bright and blinding, offering countless opportunities, even in the night — something the dim and quiet Hasetsu could never give. The car honks and shouts that lasted throughout the day and night; a masterpiece in its own right. If she closed her eyes. The symphony would be in her ear, would pierce through her tired eyelids. The colorful city lights instead of the green and golden sunlight, car honks that were like chirps of birds in her ears. She pushed off the railing, her pace picking up, her hand held out. Beijing may not be like Hasetsu, but it was both dark and colorful. And under both the shadow created by the shadows, she was embraced by the dark. 

_Find light in the beautiful sea,_

_I choose to be happy.  
_

She was nobody. Truly. Under this starless sky. Alone. Maybe for only this minute. Maybe only for this minute. But alone. Alone and free to be who she wanted to be.

_Shine bright like a diamond,_

She didn't have to close her eyes to be alone — as she had to be on the sparkling,  _light_  rink. In this colorful,  _night_ , cityscape, filled with people and cars and the smell of oil and fuel. She was never more alone and at ease. The wind blew in her face, her arms outstretched, running. 

_Shining bright like a diamond,_

_We’re beautiful like diamonds in the sky._

_Shine bright like a diamond._

_***_

Admit her euphoria, Yui thinks she sees something in the distance. Twinkling. Sparkling. Like a diamond. 

_Maybe somewhere. Wherever he is, Yuuri will be able to see it where he is._

She laughs. Her laughter drowned out by the noise of the cars below.

And maybe _,_   _maybe_. Wherever he is, it'll be able to guide him too.

_Eye to eye,_

_So alive,_

_We're beautiful like diamonds in the sky._

***

But in the end, how would we know how many people like Yui they have seen?

How many wars they have watched began and finished through the millenniums and eons? 

Did they really guide us, or were they simply delusions made from our desperate minds to give us condolences that somewhere, out there. Even if they weren't alive, something was out there, on our side. Willing to listen to us, and guide us out of the wrong and lost.

But in the end, as those things we began to call 'stars' hung in the vast opens we named the 'sky' sparkled and shone and gazed down at us, we began to want to reach. To touch them. To love them.

***


	11. nine. "comfort of distance."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha guess what?! yui has friends!!!!!!
> 
> and btw, i'm not insulting china or Chinese people by any means (i'm also chinese so yeah)
> 
> or anyone with the names mentioned below...
> 
> skip to 19-20 minutes during the later chapter of tokyo ghoul ost on youtub

 

***

_"So take,_

_a piece of my heart,_

_and make it all your own,_

_so when we are apart,_

_you'll never be alone."_

_—_ **_Shawn Mendes_ ** _,_ _ Never Be Alone _

_***_

It was true that the sparkling ice that would always be imprinted on the back of her eyelids instead of the glittering black-and-white keys. 

But even after she left skating, Yui had always had little moments with people, here and there, no matter how small, no matter how short, even if they were just things taken for granted, that she cherished to the bottom of her heart.

Keiliy Jansen was one of them.

***

" _You bitch_!" The shrieking voice of her best friend blares through the speaker. "What the fuck are you doing in  _China_?!" 

Yui giggles, at least three inches away from her phone and her boisterous, bubbly, fluent-in-six-languagues, blonde bombshell of a best friend. "Hi Keiliy~" She greets the cellist. "How're you doing?"

"You bitch!" She snarls again. "Don't 'how're you going' me! Do you know how much bullshit I got from the director about you suddenly putting the contract on hold? They got  _Larry and Daniel_ to play the piano and change it from a  _solo_  to a duet. A solo  _you_  were supposed to play!  _Larry and Daniel!_  For Christ sake, Yui!"

The dark haired pianist, having left the room during a quarter of her best friend's rant to get a can of soda just hummed. "Ah, so you  _don't_  want to hear about Viktor Nikiforov?"

"What, why would I care about hi— Wait.  _Viktor Nikiforov?!"_

Yui grinned and decided to test the waters. "So you  _do_ , or you  _don't_?"

Silence. And then it shatters. " _Wait! You mean_ ** _the_** _Viktor Nikiforov?! As your super greek god hot, bootylicious, ex?! That video! Right! Wait. Isn't he dating Yuuri Katsuki now? That underclassman that you always complain about?!"_

"Yep!" Yui chirps, gingerly tearing apart a bag of chips. 

"You  _have_  to give me  _all of the details_ , Yui! So tell me! What happened? Were there any tension? Any sexual tension? Any chance of you guys getting back together?! Or  _nooo,_ better yet,  _GET ME A NUDE PHOTO OF HIM I CAN USE ON PHOTOSHOP!_ " Yui sweats dropped and looked away from the device that was projecting the blonde's voice from across the globe. It was slightly creepy how that while Keiliy was so faraway, it still felt like she was over her shoulder and peering at her computer screen, commenting on the latest anime she got obsessed with.

Two years ago, the space between would have been a forest fire; crackling branches, heat and moving, flickering, ghostly flames of heat licking at the skin around her heart — fragile, and unknowing of its the burn and destruction it would leave in its trail. Only transfixed by its faithful warmth and unyielding boldness. And when she finally did realize that the fire she had wouldn't be enough to play with the blazing inferno, it was too late. That fire; once so beautiful, so passionate, now became a looming, inescapable omen and the threat, the  _choker_  of a destiny and fate that couldn't be escaped. 

But then came Keiliy, so selfless, so bubbly and lovable and friendly who had been hurt so ,any times before; but managed to break through by herself in the end, it was then that Yui had felt a spark of the flame that once drove her again. However, truth be told, when the two of them had met online; on a site that they both wrote works occasionally, neither had really like each other; Yui, with her (then) aloof personality, and Keiliy with her bubbly, feisty and perverted nature. It wasn't until that they found they were in the same orchestra that they started to warm up to each other. 

Yui swung her legs back and forth, now perched on the high stool by the kitchen counter. She snickers. "Who're you gonna photoshop on?"

It was common knowledge that Keiliy was a huge pervert. But if she could get anymore  _hentai_  than she is, then Yui supposed that she should also announce to the world on her Instagram account:  _@akaashi_yui_ , that she was also a  _fujioshi_  and obsessed with BL (boy love) almost as much as Yui was with anime and skating. It wouldn't hurt to include the fact that one of Keiliy's favorite pastimes (a hobby she was almost  _annoyingly_  good and ingenious at) was photoshopping the naked/half-naked bodies of male skaters after she met Yui.

"Yuuri Katsuki and Yuri Plisetsky~" Keiliy sang. Yui spat out her water harshly, then began coughing and hacking and reached for a paper to wipe the liquid that came out of her nose. 

Her blonde best friend continued, unaware of how much Yui was wishing she could just bang her head on the corner of the counter edge and commit suicide. Because she  _couldn't_ unheard those words. "Maybe I'll even add Christophe Giacometti and that Canadian skater— what's his name... Right! JJ Leroy!"

" _SAY WHAT?!"_

_***_

What's said can't be unsaid.

What's heard cannot be unheard.

In short—

Yui had been traumatized for life.

***

The joy, even if it was only a tiny bit compared to the annoyance that had welled when Keiliy started ranting (which Yui should've never let her start; she just  _doesn't_ shut up) about the new Yaoi (boyxboy) manga she found in some old rift store or garage sale, lingered till morning but quickly disappeared when she saw the bags under Yuuri's bloodshot eyes.

 _Damn_. She had completely forgotten about Yuuri's stage fright. 

_But where was—_

Wondering grey eyes met cerulean ones, and for a moment Yui almost snapped her neck backwards Yuuri's face as a faint blush crawled up her cheeks when she noticed the the smile; faint, weary, yet pleased. Slowly, Yui felt her own face submerging in a hesitant smile that emerged from the depth of her visage.

_Honestly. That man..._

The spark was an ember.

***

Yuuri was okay until when Giacometti showed up. Honestly. That man, besides being perverted (he and Keiliy would get along well) he also has the hobby of making extremely unnecessary comments that a lot of the times, were the fatal blows to people— not just skater, but  _people's_  feelings. Honestly, coming from Yui— someone who usually doesn't hold back on using the wide vocabulary of colorful words and scathing insults;  _Christophe Giacometti knows no limits_.

"You  _really_ don't know when to shut up." Yui drawls when she sees that Yuuri, Viktor and Chris's annoying old fart, self-proclaimed-non-tinted-sunglasses-equals-glasses coach is out of sight.

He tilts his head and runs a tanned hand through his blond curls. "You're still as blunt as ever  _Yui-chan_."

Her lips curled around her teeth.  _He has some nerve._  "You still like sticking your nose to where it doesn't belong as always."

Laughing, he leans against the wall that has been covered by logos. "It's just as I said to Yuuri, Yui- _senpai_." His eyes take on a mischievous edge. "People will hate you for taking Viktor from them; you know that better than anyone else. Some people might even  _still_ hate you. Let's face it, I tried to soften the words for Yuuri- _kun_ , but with you..."

"Neither of us are stranger to this." Yui looks at him with indifferent eyes.

"Haha, I should've known you wouldn't be as effected as Yuuri." He leans closer. Against the better part of herself, Yui feels a thread of dread crawling up her spine. "Besides, the distance between you two is great. To you, it may have only felt like two years. But to us, two years is a lifetime." He draws back. "Don't think you can just steal him from us again because you have Yuuri beside you."

His parting words echo in her ears, and she glances at the shadow of his figure; tilting and twisting to avoid the light he was walking into. Trying to hide itself — the illusion, from the uncharted waters the very thing they copy crudely was embracing bravely.

And beyond him; Yuuri, waving, his jelled, ebony hair shinning under the spotlight. Calling, saying words that she couldn't hear. And beside Yuuri, even farther, the wind jacket and the silver hair. 

_So close... Yet so faraway..._

Something she could reach out and touch with her fingertips. The wispy, dancing flames that drew her in. Enamored her in another way the wildfire had charmed her. The distant, fading music.

It was a beautiful sound and a beautiful sight, she realized, from the distance between her and Yuuri and Viktor. The  _Takane no Hana;_  the flower on a high cliff. The thing that is unreachable, but still so very beautiful in its own way. 

But Yuuri was not unreachable. 

And for that very reason, Yui would stay away until she was positive she would not be burned when she finally reached for him. Yui would stay away until she was sure that he would not become the flower on a high cliff skating and Viktor might have been to her two years ago. 

The comfort of distance, she would reach them when she is ready, for now, she is a nobody.

A nobody that is witnessing the start of a beautiful tale.

***

_"Distance is not for the fearful, it's for the bold. It's for those who are willing to spend a lot of time alone in exchange for a little time with the one they love. It's for those knowing a good thing when they see it, even if they don't see it nearly enough..."_

**― Meghan Daum**

***

 


	12. midway

_"A song like you would never tell me the truth..._   
_It would turn me on, break me down,_   
_make me feel like there is nothing outside this room._   
_A song like you would have me lost in my youth—_   
_Oh, baby, a song like you..."_

Bea Miller,  ** _a song like you_**

_***_

_my apologies for the long wait to all of my reader: who i'll have know whose support and encourage have always made my day better by simply clicking that vote button or making a comment that cracks me up or just makes me grin stupidly._

_i wasn't originally going to post this chapter seeing as it's just another lyric of a song: but, since it made a perfect break: i'll post my a/n alongside this and use it as a monument to remind myself that i have gotten through this writer's block._

_so, call it a confession, if you will._

_yes_   _, this a/n will be long. you're welcome to just skip this and wait the chapter coming friday._

_*_

_i stopped writing this book a month before my theory exam began. i posted a chapter in all of my written books documenting that. however, when the first week of studying past, i felt like an extremely heavy weight had been lifted off of my shoulders._

_i am a student, yes. i have exams to prepare for, parents to please, friends to interact, homework to complete and when i started writing this book; chapters to write, and plots to plan._

_at first, it had been exciting and fun: i had never had my work as well received as_   _presto_   _, and reader's feedback made me happy. but i knew if i wanted to make this book receive more recognition by updating regularly: after all, who'd read a book from an author who practically never updates? so i followed a schedule i had made; but soon, it became tedious. i had never been a particularly dedicated person, and seeing this book had actually made ten weeks (about three months) of continuous updating actually surprised me. but eventually, even my interest in the anime began to drop: it was a very entertaining and well-thought out anime, but there were always new ones to anticipate and old ones to rewatch._

_so, gradually, my passion for this book slipped away._

_then came my two months trip to china._

_i managed to force myself to squeeze in a chapter before i left. and i'm ashamed that i'd been so, so_   _relieved  _ _to be able to have a justified break away from writing. i thought that seeing more things in china, doing other things, and well, just_   _being away_   _, would return my freshness for_   _presto._

_unfortunately: it did the exact opposite._

_when i reread_   _presto_   _after coming back, i felt like i was seeing the character i had created and been so proud of come to life in a different light from before._

 _it was_   _cliched_   _, and suddenly yui seemed like a stubborn person who was unwilling to let go of the past, yet to scared to face the future, and_   _completely,_   _utterly  _ _attached to viktor._

_yui seemed like an underdeveloped, badly made, and yandere._

_so, i continued my hiatus and tried to edit my chapters into something i'm satisfied with. but over another couple weeks of thinking, i realized in some ways, her thoughts and actions are justified._

_yui isn't entirely what you would call sane, or someone who has a stable mentality around certain subjects. i'm sure all of you have realized this, and by the way: being un-sane is in no way meaning she's an absolute psycho or lunatic that needs to go to mental asylum or psych wards._

_she's probably someone who experiences post-traumatic stress disorder or post-traumatic breakdowns. or, maybe thantophobia -- the fear of being alone._

_viktor is someone who is like one of yui's mental pillars of support and an almost physical remainder that she deserves to well, be here. a protector whom most people would usually have as their parents, but in yui's case became viktor, as yui's died when she was young (there, another cliché)._

_another cliché that started another chain of reaction is that i also made yui a genius, and well, geniuses are isolated because they are smart, so she's never made any friends until she was practically in her mid-teens: thus the sadism and sarcasm that's become what most misunderstood people have called 'safety mechanism(s)' to shield themselves, walls to keep their feelings from getting hurt. besides, it doesn't exactly help that her only friends are literally a bunch of skating nerds while the only family she knows are more dorks while her little brother in name only is this overweight, self-hating, addicted to a dish with high calories (hence the overweight part) who's never been great at anything other than being an depression eater._

_not to mention that yui's been exposed to the media; the hungry sharks and vultures that can scar people for life and never leaves you alone. and that she entered not one, but_   _two  _ _industries with extreme rivalries and lying and betrayals. honestly, even thinking about that gives me a migraine._

_so i asked myself: have i really, created such a complex, un-understandable, and clichéd character that i don't even know how to write anymore?_

_i didn't know at the time. so i tried to read the books of other writers in the fandom, and tried to ease myself back little by little: rewatching the episodes, listening to the OSTs reading the wiki profiles of the seiyuu's and the characters themselves, and i suppose it did wonders._

_slowly i rediscovered the hype i had when i first watched the trailer and when the first episode came out, slowly i began to start writing 'base' chapters on my phone, again and started actually forming sentences and ideas that could make a chapter._

_so, if you read my fanfic. thank you._

_if you're reading this._

_thank you._

_regardless, i can promise that a chapter will come within the next two weeks._

_-lyse_

hey look...

i wasted almost one thousand words to write my faults

*sighs*

 


	13. ten. "no rest for wicked."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOD I'VE WRITTEN A CHAPTER
> 
> thank you for everyone who has supported me through this writer block. whether it was on wattpad, quotev, archive of our own, or any where else. 
> 
> thank you.
> 
> really, from the bottom of my heart. 
> 
> thank you. 
> 
> i really appreciate all of you understanding my case and helping me through it, and still willing to follow me down this path. and sentiments aside, i'll say that honestly, i don't believe this chapter was necessarily on the quality or emotions of my previous chapters. 
> 
> also, sentiments aside, updates will now probably be bi-weekly. which means there will be no updates each week, but one every two weeks. however, if i do manage to get a chapter done in one week, then that chapter may very well be published that week.
> 
> thank you,
> 
> -lyse

【[please listen](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uroC9cwel-A)】

"How noglastic," murmured Yui, stepping off the train and into the snowy wonderland of Russia.

They had landed a couple hours ago, with Yui saying she would go ahead and the others telling her that they would meet her back at the hotel while she soured internally at the thought of having to spend more days in a five-star hotel with the rest of the Grand Prix Finals competitors. Really, it had been annoying when she was still skating to go to those 'unsaid' meetings in hotels, it was even more annoying (and more awkward than she'd admit) to go to them now. Not that she didn't mind seeing Yuuri suffer, but there were better things to do besides whatever shit those people were bound to stir up.

Dragging her duffle bag up the stairs of the apartment, she grinned at the ancient grey door of Ivana Serbryakov.

_She is so gonna flip when she sees me just barging into her home like the old days._

Pulling up the welcome mat by the door, she winces at the smell that emits from the wet, dead moss under the mat, but is suddenly grateful for Russia's nuclear winters because no bugs come skittering out nor any other unwelcome visitors. Yui shudders even at the thought of spiders and anything that isn't an ant — even butterflies scared her if they came closer than a  _foot_.

She snatched the keys under the mat and opened the door, setting down her duffle bag, her gaze travels through the apartment and its dark atmosphere.

Well, she could wait. That was for sure.

After all, she's been waiting for the past two years; what a couple hours going to do to her, Yui Akaashi?

***

Yui liked 'working' in the living room best; a wide space all to herself, a bank piece of music sheet perched in front of her, and more often than not — a laptop or her phone displaying the latest episode of the anime/tv show she got hooked on. She doesn't know how many episodes of the psychological, political anime she had watched until the light by the hallway that led to the door flickered on and a threatening female voice yelled in angry russian. 

"I don't know who you are, or what you want, but if you don't come out this second, I will report you to security!"

Snickering under her breath, she turns off her phone and turns on the kitchen light, grinning. 

"Miss me, bitch- _nee-san?_ " 

Ivana Serbryakov's dainty bronze-blonde eyebrows raise, and her death grip on her phone relaxes. Rolling her eyes, she gestures for her to sit down while Ivana shuffled around for a few more minutes before settling down in front of her with a scowl.

Yui leans back, eyes smiling condescendingly and teeth flashing. For a moment, she remembers the days when the woman had been that shinning, ethereal goddess in a gown of white, and the days that her dress slowly wrinkled to grey, then eventually faded to black.

"What do you want?" the former two time, Belgian, Olympic champion bites out. 

They were like rocks, Yui mused. Some of them were gems; and if they were lucky enough, they would become molded and cut enough that they were cherished. But others were only abandoned on the shoreline, slowly being washed away; like the ink of math tests she wrote a decade ago that eventually decided her fate. 

Indeed, that was both their own destiny; while Yui had not loved skating enough.

Ivana had loved it too much. 

Loved it so much that in the end, it  _destroyed her._

But that's what had drawn them together. The same purpose sought by two utterly different people. And the desire of two utterly ruined individuals. For neither the two of them were who they were before they had met each other. 

But she was grateful to have met Ivana all the same.

Yui smiles genuinely, this time. Even if to the other woman's eyes, it was no more than another sneer from the bitch herself.

"I want your help." 

~

Yui could feel herself changing. 

The shine of Russia's wintry atmosphere no longer made her wince when it reminded her of the ice, the unfinished painting of the streets and half-colored shop were beautiful enough that she could take a minute to admire the display windows of the shop instead of hurrying back to home — colder and even more colourless than the uncolored spaces in the world around her — escaping from the people and violet shadows of the times that were long gone. 

The knots that had tangled themselves around her were slowly unwinding, letting her slowly feel the wind rushing by her ears. The seagulls above the St. Petersburg sky. Her normally dark clothes had slowly reverted to floral-printed vintage dresses and bright sweaters, her dark hair draping to her shoulders, freed from its shackle of ponytails and fishtails. The ice in her lungs were slowly melting; chilling, biting winds of the snow, pale breaths against the cloudy, sun-cracked sky; the thick aroma of coffee, the tender, sweet smell of hot chocolate, the balm of her fruit-flavored lip palm and the light, flowery fragrance of the perfume she'd catch a whiff from the flutters of Ivana's coattails. 

There were really only two season in Russia.

Summers in Petersburg had been beautiful. But its winters were absolutely exquisite: with its shops that only seemed to shine more inside the snowy wonderland. People looked like porcelain people that were designed delicately by a skillful master creator. And as she walked by, Yui would sometimes find parks that she might remember to have had a painted piano, a field that once may have been overgrowing with daisies, all covered with snow — but still overflowing with the beautiful remains of the summer before.

Whistling appreciatively as they ducked through a narrow gate under a bridge, Yui pulled out her mauve colored phone and snapped a picture. "I bet most of the locals wouldn't even know about this place."

She only caught a faint " _maybe I've brought you here to kill you and then proceed to abandon you in a ditch_ " from the older Belgian woman. 

Yui laughed. 

They stopped in front of the dark, club with an unlit neon sign.

She met Ivana at this club when she was sixteen. Back then, Ivana, a renowned pupil of the famous Lilia Baranovskaya. Yui had heard of a club that was a retreat for street musicians in winter days and a club at night from Mila Babicheva. 

Yui had thought it to be peculiar and checked it out, but to her utter amusement, it really had been what Mila told her to be. It was a book store with a shady background during the day on the first floor, while the second was full of hangover people, undiscovered, passionate, artistic young people waiting for their big break; designers, musicians, photographers, etcetera., and old men and women just sitting around chattering over crocheting and other senior activity. And with a tweed jacket and a beige scarf, she fit right among them. 

That was, until she met Ivana.

Clattering up the fires escape that led up to the back of the second floor, with a gloved hand and a disgusted look at the rusted door, Ivana pushed open the door and the two of them were greeted with the familiar smell and sight of coffee, beer, beanies, mats, loveseats, and loud chattering and fights breaking across the room all at once. 

" _Yo, yo yo!_ " Someone yells in english. " _Look who finally came back!_ "

A cackling blond with piercings and dyed bangs appear in front of them.

Yui laughs. 

This was heaven for all psychos.

***

 

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah, Yuri!!! on Ice is an upcoming skating anime that I'm super excited for, and this is me waiting for it to come out. That's the trailer. :)


End file.
